When the youth of Baltimore gathered before City Hall in a recent Black Lives Matter protest march, the song played over the PA was Eze Jackson’s “Be Great,” from his recent sixth album, Fool, and it was a fitting choice. After all, since his arrival at the age of nine with a single mother from New York, Jackson has made the harbor city his adopted home, launching a music career that included three albums fronting the hip-hop collective Soul Cannon and three solo albums, with a five-song EP, Goals, about to be released. As founder, creator and chief visionary of the burgeoning entertainment and media company EPIC FAM (Every Person Is Coming From A Memory), a collective of local talent, Eze is committed to supporting the Baltimore artistic community with a creative support system. As Baltimore Magazine put it, “It’s hard to envision the Baltimore music scene without Eze Jackson.” Jackson’s role models are the regional rap scenes that originated in New Orleans (Master P’s No Limit and the Williams brother’s Cash Money), Houston (Geto Boys and Rap-A-Lot Records), Atlanta (OutKast and Goodie Mob), Detroit (Eminem, Black Milk and Guilty Simpson) and Staten Island (Wu Tang Clan), with a special nod to films like State Property (with Beanie Sigel) and New Jack City (starring Wesley Snipes and Ice-T) and the Native Tongue bands like A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Leaders of the New School and Poor Righteous Teachers.